Malabo authorities announced on Monday the death in Oveng Azem prison in Mongomo of political opponent Julio Obama Mefuman, who also has Spanish nationality, angering the opposition, according to information relayed by the AFP agency.
Mefuman, 51, had been held in this prison since his alleged abduction in late 2019 in South Sudan. He “died in a hospital in Mongomo as a result of an illness,” Equatoguinean Foreign Minister Simeon Oyono Esono Angue said on Twitter.
In a statement, the Movement for the Liberation of the Third Republic of Equatorial Guinea (MLGE3R), in exile in Spain, accuses the Equatoguinean regime of having « tortured » Obama Mefuman, as well as three other opponents arrested at the same time as him.
In early January 2020, Amnesty International raised alarm over the disappearance, in November 2019, of four opponents of the regime in place in Malabo, a few days after their arrival in South Sudan. These men, who were returning from Spain where they were resident, had been « abducted and transferred to Equatorial Guinea », according to the NGO.
Mefuman’s death comes two weeks after Spanish justices announced an investigation into Madrid into the « kidnapping » and torture of Julio Obama Mefuman and another opponent, Feliciano Efa Mangue, also of Spanish nationality.
The procedure targets three senior security officials in Equatorial Guinea close to President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, including one of his sons, Carmelo Ovono Obiang, who serves as the head of foreign intelligence.
More than the Equatorial Guinean opposition, human rights organizations also reacted. The case of Amnesty International which, on Twitter, called on the head of state to « ensure that an urgent and independent investigation is opened into the death » of Mefuman, while urging Malabo on the need to « enforce the right of prisoners to be treated with dignity […] without being tortured or subjected to other ill-treatment”.
By OMA Newsletter N° 1011 of 17/01/2023
Article published under the direction of Dr. Najib Kettani
The OMA, NGO with an Intercontinental vocation
For the development of cultural exchanges
Valuing human potential
The promotion and consolidation of Africa’s development, and
Inter-African integration
